Today's Internet search tools may be successful at helping a consumer find a consumptible, such as a product or service, according to specific consumptible attributes. For example, a consumer accessing a searchable web site providing listings for houses may obtain a list of homes in a consumer-specified area that match search criteria for price, number of bedrooms, number of baths, square footage, and similar search criteria that are objectively measurable in a directly quantifiable fashion. Similarly, one may expect in other domains to obtain, for example, an identification of an automobile based on price, horsepower, wheelbase, torque, towing capacity, and similar criteria that are objectively measurable in a directly quantifiable fashion. Today's tools, however, suffer from the need to require a particular consumer to identify an appropriate set of consumptible attributes with specific values and/or value ranges when searching for a matching consumptible. As a result, today's tools fail to accurately match a consumptible to a particular consumer's subjectively perceptible needs relating to consumer benefits derived from one or more consumptible attributes.
Today's Internet search tools are unsuitable for assisting consumers in making decisions because consumers needing assistance in identifying a consumptible that meets their individual needs typically may not be experts in fields relating to the corresponding consumptible categories. As a result, they typically lack the expertise required to translate their subjectively perceived needs relating to customer benefits into the consumptible attributes and associated performance values from which those benefits are derived. Therefore, the need remains for a consumptible identification system and method that successfully matches a consumptible identity to a particular consumer based on a prioritization of consumer needs and expertly identified relationships between consumer needs and consumptible identities associated with the consumptible category. The present invention fulfills this need.